White House seeks balanced way' to budget fix

In this Sunday, Feb. 17, 2013, file photo provided by CBS News new White House Chief or Staff Denis McDonough speaks on CBS's "Face the Nation" in Washington. On talk shows Sunday McDonough said Obama is concerned about the effect the automatic budget cuts, scheduled for next month, will have on America's middle class. He said the economy has been getting stronger over the past few months, and cited improvements in housing, the stock market and consumer confidence. McDonough also said the White House will push for what he calls a reasonable amount of spending cuts coupled with additional tax revenue. (AP Photo/CBS News,Chris Usher)

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama is concerned about the effect that looming, drastic across-the-board budget cuts will have on the middle class, his new chief of staff said Sunday. Congressional Republicans predicted the cuts would start as scheduled next month and blamed Obama not only for doing little to stop them but for the idea itself.

The cuts, called the sequester, would drain $85 billion from the government’s budget over the coming seven months. Actual cuts may be around 13 percent for defense and 9 percent for other programs because lawmakers delayed their impact, requiring savings over a shorter period of time. The White House last week let loose a list of ways Americans would feel the trims, from longer waits at airport security to as many as 13,000 teachers being laid off. Outgoing Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta told a congressional panel the sequester would hollow the U.S. military because it would give the Pentagon little leeway in deciding how best to spend the money.

Denis McDonough, the president’s chief of staff, warned the cuts would come as the stock market is coming back, the housing market has improved and the number of jobs has grown, and urged Congress to consider a balanced approach that would further strengthen the economy and, in turn, the middle class.

“This isn’t a spending fight for us,” McDonough told NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “This is a fight about whether we’re going to make the investments in middle class families in this country, in education, in science and technology, in food inspection, and those kinds of things.”

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Senate Democrats last week offered a plan they say is a balanced approach of more revenue and budget cuts. The White House supports the proposal, but it drew an icy reception from Republicans, who say the president got the tax increases he wanted during the agreement to avoid the “fiscal cliff.”

“The question isn’t whether we’re going to insist on some position because that’s the ideologically right position,” McDonough said. “This should not be a social science experiment. This should be a question where we ask ourselves, what is most important to the economy, what is most important to the middle class families of this country, and that’s the way the president is going to do this.”

South Carolina’s Sen. Lindsay Graham was among the Republicans on Sunday who recalled the president’s position on the sequester in the fall.

“The president promised in the campaign sequestration would not happen. Now, he is allowing it to happen,” Graham said on “Fox News Sunday.”

“He’s the commander-in-chief and on his watch, we’re going to begin to unravel the finest military in the history of the world, at a time when we need it most,” Graham, a member of the Armed Services Committee added. “If you want to look at ways to find $1.2 trillion in savings over the next decade, let’s look at Obamacare. Let’s don’t destroy the military and just cut blindly across the board. There are many ways to do this.”

However, Graham offered no specifics.

The Democrats propose generating revenue from plugging some tax loopholes. Those include tax breaks for the oil and gas industry and businesses that have sent jobs overseas and taxing millionaires at a rate of at least 30 percent.

Rep. Paul Ryan, who chairs the Budget Committee, advocates for plugging loopholes, but as part of a discussion on tax reform, not sequestration.

“Loopholes are necessary for tax reform,” Ryan said on ABC’s “This Week.” “If you take them for spending, you’re blocking tax reform and you’re really not getting the deficit under control.”

With the March 1 deadline fast approaching, Sen. Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat and close ally of the White House, predicted that Republicans will eventually join Democrats to avoid the cuts.

“They have no choice,” Schumer said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “Their arguments are untenable and don’t meet the favor of hardly anyone other than themselves and the special interests they’re protecting.”